Bring me long-running dramas like The Killing, says BBC One chief - Telegraph BBC Bring me long-running dramas like The Killing, says BBC One chief BBC One is set to commission longer-running drama series, in the mould of American shows such as The Wire and Mad Men, after its new controller Danny Cohen said that they are “something to aspire to”. The Killing: Sofie Grabol stars as Sarah Lund in the Danish drama. Photo: BBC By Neil Midgley , Assistant Editor (Media) 12:01AM BST 03 May 2011 Follow Traditionally, the BBC’s only long-running dramas have been soaps such as EastEnders and Holby City, and family shows early on Saturday evenings, such as Doctor Who and Merlin. The corporation’s flagship dramas at 9pm, such as Spooks and New Tricks, are commissioned for a maximum of eight or 10 episodes - compared to the standard annual run of 22 or 24 episodes for American dramas such as CSI, House or 24.

Speaking to a Broadcasting Press Guild event, Mr Cohen said that “it would be very nice” for BBC One to have a series like The Killing, the sophisticated Danish detective thriller that was a cult success when it was shown on BBC Four earlier this year, and which ran for 20 episodes. The Killing attracted audiences of over 500,000 viewers every Saturday night, despite being made in Danish and shown with subtitles. Critics praised its long episode run for allowing authentic storytelling and character development, especially of its central character, the enigmatic police detective Sarah Lund. “Yes, if you could do it, it would be something to aspire to,” said Mr Cohen. “We’re not brilliantly set up as an industry in the UK to do it in the way the American industry is with more of a team writing model.

So there’s some quite big structural changes that we’d have to make to deliver that, and I think we should, but you can’t force creatives into it very easily.” Related Articles The Killing, Channel 4, preview 07 Jul 2011 Mr Cohen said that “we’re encouraging people to try and think like that”, and cited the long-running BBC One sitcom My Family as an example of a show that was created in that way. His comments mark a shift from the BBC’s previous position, which has been to commission the best ideas in comedy and drama from individual writers rather than setting up the kind of “writers’ rooms” that are common on American shows such as Friends or 30 Rock. In a speech last September, the BBC’s head of drama commissioning, Ben Stephenson, said: “I’m not afraid of saying we shouldn’t compete with America when it comes to 24-part series – our business models are completely different. What I do believe is that the BBC should embrace everything that is uniquely British. We should be the single greatest home of authored drama that entertains and stimulates.

Single writers crafting great work whether that is 10-part series, singles plays or serials.” Mr Stephenson defended the decision to only commission three 90-minute episodes of Sherlock, which was the BBC’s biggest new drama hit last year. In America, said Mr Stephenson, the programme’s lead writer Steven Moffat “would not be able to write Sherlock how he wants to. He would be biffed off and replaced with a showrunner who could give create a financially acceptable model of 24 episodes.” Mr Stephenson added: “We are not going to commission 24-part series or classic drama because critics tell us to – but we may well if a creative has a bold idea.” Adam Crozier, the chief executive of ITV, has also said that he wants his company to create long-running, returnable dramas that can then be sold around the world. tv crime | Nordic Noir: The Scandinavian Crime Book Club | Page 2 Nordic Noir: The Scandinavian Crime Book Club ‘Sarah Lund’ in London promoting The Killing II (SOLD OUT) The Killing's Sarah Lund (Sofie Gråbøl).

(Photo: BBC Four) Actress Sofie Gråbøl will be in London for a The Killing II preview and a Question & Answer session at BAFTA in late October. The event is presented by BAFTA in partnership with BBC Four and the Embassy of Denmark in London. The BAFTA TV Preview and Q&A Interview with actress Sofie Gråbøl and senior producer Piv Bernth takes place at BAFTA’s Princess Anne Theatre on October 31st at 18:30. Unfortunately tickets are already sold out for this event, before the Book Club even heard that a date had been found for the event. Hopefully, some book-club members got tickets and can blog and tweet from the event. Visit the Danish Embassy website for further information about the event and the forthcoming second season of The Killing. BBC is yet to announce when the first episode of The Killing II will be aired. Podcasts from Previous Events I have now posted podcasts from the first meetings in the Nordic Noir Book Club on the website and this blog (see the pages “Shadows in the Snow” and “Secrets of the Ash” at the top of the blog page).

We have recorded the talks and following discussions with Håkan Nesser, Yrsa Sigurdardottir, Francis Hopkinson and Richard Wall, and hope many more than the fortunate book club members who could make it to London will now be able to enjoy the wonderful talks we have had so far. Please leave comments on the events and podcast on the relevant pages. The Killing, Channel 4 | The Arts Desk Home > tv > The Killing, Channel 4 The Killing, Channel 4 | reviews, news & interviews The Killing, Channel 4 US remake of dark Danish drama is overshadowed by the original by Kieron Tyler Friday, 08 July 2011 Share The Killing: Mireille Enos as Sarah Linden, a remarkable doppelgänger of Forbrydelsen’s Sarah Lund The leap from BBC Four to Channel 4 is more than the flick of a switch. Migrating from the BBC’s digital channel to its terrestrial broadcast has transformed the Danish noir drama Forbrydelsen. It's now in English. It’s become American. Copenhagen has been banished. The alchemist responsible is US TV network AMC.

Channel 4’s screening of the US remake of The Killing will attract more viewers than BBC Four ever could, but it’s impossible to watch the Seattle-set makeover without thinking back to the original BBC - BBC TV blog: The Killing on BBC Four The Killing on BBC Four Richard Klein | 16:30 UK time, Thursday, 1 September 2011 The Killing is back! Well, we're repeating all of the first series in its entirety, at least. The whole original and best version in one mad block of programmes so that fans and newcomers, people who missed the series first time around, and those hungry to watch it again, can submerge themselves in an ocean of Danish criminal procedure, Faroese pullovers and riveting whodunnit tension. I loved it the first time round. Deputy Superintendent Sarah Lund (Sofie Gråbøl) and Jan Meyer (Søren Malling) Such an original piece of work, classy and beautifully plotted, the real draw of The Killing is its masterful and unyielding determination to stay focused on that single murder, that single investigation and that single (not to say singular) police investigator, Sarah Lund .

Yet at the same time it does not shy away from the mass of rippling consequence that comes to so many individuals when an act of brutality comes smashing into otherwise relatively still lives. I feel, and have always done, that BBC Four is the place to showcase the best of television from around the world, and that language - ie not English - isn't a barrier to the channel's audience. In some ways, oddly, The Killing's sub-titles actually help. It allows us to focus and concentrate and really absorb the other-worldness of the programme. BBC Four is the premier channel for people who like to think, for whom authorship, intelligent comment and entertaining perspective on mainstream subjects is their way of enjoying television. And, perhaps, in Sarah Lund there is a character who reflects something of these traits in her own character. Pernille Birk Larsen (Ann Eleonora Jørgensen) and Theis Birk Larsen (Bjarne Henriksen) Singular, often unpredictable but always inquiring and as a consequence, both interesting and attractive. There will be some who say that this should be noted even more because she is a woman. I disagree.

Though the actress Sofie Gråbøl explains she treated the role of Lund by acting like a man to start off with, in the drama her gender is, in my view, noteworthy only because it actually doesn't matter. She is a police officer with an utter fascination for detective work, and in that one compulsion, her personal life suffers - an always watchable trait in our television police dramas. At the same time, The Killing is most definitely a story of our times in whatever society we live in. The family dramas, the workplace frictions, the media pressures, the modern politics: I feel we can all relate to that. So enjoy this chance to watch The Killing again, and prepare yourselves for the return of Sophie Lund in The Killing II later this year, exclusively on BBC Four. Richard Klein is the controller of BBC Four . He recently wrote about the channel's new role as curator of archive BBC content on the About the BBC Blog . The Killing series one continues on BBC Four daily at 10pm until September 15th. Comments made by writers on the BBC TV blog are their own opinions and not necessarily those of the BBC.

How British television fell under the spell of Nordic noirThe Tu - Telegraph Follow It is hard, now, to remember a time before the death of a young woman named Nanna Birk Larsen. Yet it is barely three years since BBC Four viewers were introduced to The Killing , and its uniquely Danish way of solving Nanna’s murder. It heralded such a spate of “Nordic noir” – notably including The Bridge and Borgen – that Scandinavian shows are now as integral to the British TV drama landscape as EastEnders or Marple. So much so, that some of their tricks are being stolen by our own new series. INTERVIEW: The Killing's Sofie Gråbøl ‘I’m not emotional about leaving Sarah Lund – she’s fiction’ Much of The Killing’s appeal may simply have been down to its exoticism. Brits were fascinated by Copenhagen’s mayoral politics, jumpers from the Faroe Islands, and people called Troels. No British drama series could compete with that. But what our own producers are doing is to learn from the TV craft that the Danes and the Swedes practise with such flair.

Sofie Gråbøl as Sarah Lund in The Killing Photo: BBC The Killing took 20 episodes to solve one murder – a series length, and slow rate of progress, that would have been unthinkable for a UK production. Both Borgen and The Bridge are visually stunning, with as much attention paid to the production design as to the plot. (Sky Arts’s upcoming Danish series, The Legacy, is an even more cinematic visual treat.) And the Scandinavian exploration of female lead characters, such as detectives Sarah Lund and Saga Norén, and prime minister Birgitte Nyborg, puts much of British drama to shame. Related Articles READ: The Killing has given us a heroine to remember Some of the British reaction to this tour de force has been direct and obvious. In a co-production with France’s Canal+, Sky Atlantic remade The Bridge as The Tunnel , with a bisected corpse found deep under the English Channel. Both plot and characters drew heavily on the original Danish/Swedish series – notably the socially awkward French detective Elise Wassermann, played by Clémence Poésy .

“The Bridge was an incredible story, so it gave you the basis of a really great adaptation – in the same way that I think novels can be adapted again and again,” says Anne Mensah, Sky’s head of drama commissioning. Mensah argues that the differences from the original were “quite subtle”, but important. “The Tunnel had interesting things to say about two countries, Britain and France, that have huge amounts of history,” she says. “And the British detective, Karl, was called Karl for a reason. His father had had a working-class political background, which influenced his son.” Sky is now making a series called Fortitude, which also seems to have a lot of Scandinavian DNA. It is set in a remote Arctic community, where a child is found dead, and stars The Killing’s Sofie Gråbøl (though not as a detective). But, says Mensah, “You mustn’t be confused by snow. Fortitude owes as much to [Nineties US drama] Twin Peaks as it does to The Bridge.” It is, of course, impossible for a viewer to divine conclusively where a writer and cast have found their inspiration.

BBC Two’s The Fall starred Gillian Anderson as an unusually cold and distant female police detective , who could have been inspired by The Killing’s Sarah Lund – and yet its script was in development long before The Killing was shown in the UK. Chris Chibnall, the writer of ITV’s Broadchurch , denies that his series was influenced by The Killing – and yet its portrait of a mother’s grief bore remarkable similarities to that of Pernille Birk Larsen. BBC Two had a hit with 'The Fall' starring Gillian Anderson Photo: BBC More subtle motifs also seem to have migrated from Copenhagen. Channel 4’s Southcliffe and BBC Three’s In the Flesh both took their visual look from the same sludgy colour palette as The Bridge. And Broadchurch’s haunting music was by an Icelandic composer. “Whenever there is a phenomenon – and certainly Scandinavian novels and TV are a phenomenon – it can’t help but be an inspiration,” says Ben Stephenson, the BBC’s drama chief. “There are two things that I think are particularly interesting about it. For a long time, people have been saying that serialised narratives are dead – and they’re clearly not. And secondly, sense of place and location.

Those things just sort of feed into the water. I don’t think it’s conscious, those aren’t the only influences, and I think it’s only a certain type of drama.” NEWS: The Killing star Sofie Gråbøl in new British TV drama Certainly, Fortitude and The Fall are poles apart from the story-of-the-week narratives that dominated the international TV drama landscape a few years ago, in shows from CSI to Law & Order to Waking the Dead. And in Broadchurch, the cliffs of the Dorset coast are almost a character in their own right. But Stephenson also takes a longer view, saying that the darkness of BBC Two’s recent drama hits – including the police potboiler Line of Duty – also owe a debt to classic British series including Edge of Darkness, and the John Le Carré spy stories. Mensah agrees – and says that, alongside our newly found Scandinavian crime cousins, we should celebrate British stories of an even more venerable vintage. “What I think the Scandi drama does utterly brilliantly is that it takes a serialised narrative, and twists and twists and twists it, so that you feel hooked at every single moment,” she says.

“But then, so did Charles Dickens.” Mammon starts tonight on More4 at 9.00pm 5 Must-Watch Scandinavian TV Shows | The Artifice Login Sign Up 5 Must-Watch Scandinavian TV Shows Over the past five years, Scandinavia has entered a golden age (of sorts) in television. That’s not to say that their television has ever been particularly bad, per say, but recently these countries – particularly Denmark – have offered some of the most original, challenging and engaging shows around (typically dark, atmospheric police procedurals). People who live in Britain will likely be familiar with the majority of this list, but thus far US cable companies have been reluctant to show most foreign television, likely assuming audiences can’t be bothered to read subtitles. Anyway, without further ado… 5. Unit One (Rejseholdet) Following the very successful series Matador, which followed the lives of characters in a Danish town before and after German occupation in World War II (airing between 1978 and 1982), the creative minds behind Danish television had a difficult time distinguishing themselves from its legacy.

Each new show suffered from a ‘Matador complex’, where critics would unfavourably compare the new show to its much-loved precursor. However, towards the end of the 1990s Danish TV enjoyed a resurgence in popularity, and Unit One – along with other shows such as TAXA and eventually The Eagle – was a product of this. While in many ways it could be seen as a prototype of superior shows to come, Unit One was nevertheless an engaging police procedural drama, which distinguished itself with its willingness to tackle difficult social issues such as sexism and corruption. The character of Ingrid Dahl, recently promoted to homicide chief, is similar to Prime Suspect’s Jane Tennison (and many of the other female protagonists on this list) in her battle against institutionalised sexism, although arguably she lacks the balls that make her other counterparts so memorable. Yet I suspect that, without Unit One, Danish television would never have developed in such a satisfactory way. It ran for an impressive four years, won several awards (including an Emmy) and even had a young Mads Mikkelsen playing a psychotic cop. Definitely worth watching, if only to see how it all began. 4.

Borgen It seems wrong having such a successful and well-loved show so low on this list. But with such strong competition, Denmark’s bleaker counterpart to The West Wing unfortunately sits at a (still respectable!) number four position. One of the few popular Scandinavian shows on this list yet to receive a English-language remake (probably due to the abundance of US political dramas in existence), Borgen’s most notable feature was its strong female protagonist, Birgitte Nyborg Christensen, who becomes the first female Prime Minister of Denmark. Unlike much American drama, it placed an emphasis on political developments above typical family-based drama – a challenging concept for audiences to commit to, particularly when having to keep up with complex Danish names via subtitles, but one which was incredibly rewarding. Even the slightly less brilliant third series was still, well, brilliant. 3. Wallander One of the more bleak offerings in an already bleak list, Wallander gathered international attention when a widely-praised English language remake starring Kenneth Branagh was released. Yet neglecting the original Swedish series, based on Henning Mankell’s long running book series, would be a mistake. Kurt Wallander is an excellent anti-hero, an idealistic but troubled cop, whose only friend is his beloved dog.

It distinguished itself from more conventional American thrillers by focusing on character, mystery and suspense as opposed to bombastic action sequences. The show is beautifully shot, too – each episode feels like its own film (so much so that several of the episodes were released in cinemas). And out of the three incarnations of the detective, Krister Henriksson’s measured performance is probably the best. Sorry Rolf Lassgård. 2. The Bridge (Broen/Bron) This one’s a good one to catch up with, simply for the fact that it’s still going (the second series premiered on the BBC last Sunday). Despite initial impressions of a typical Scandi-noir murder mystery, The Bridge soon distinguished itself with several qualities; 1) the fact that it was a joint Swedish-Danish production, 2) the remarkable ambition of its storyline (a villain similar to the Joker is going around killing/tormenting people in creative ways), and, most importantly, 3) the excellent cop duo of Swedish Saga Norén, a clever yet comically insensitive detective somewhere on the autistic spectrum, and Danish Martin Rohde, a family man who proves to be the perfect foil for his partner.

It’s an imaginative, perfectly paced ensemble story with a heart-crushingly sad ending, so good that it was remade TWICE (the FX series with Diane Kruger and Demián Bichir, another French-English production called The Tunnel with Stephen Dillane and Clémence Poésy). Yet the original is perhaps some of the best television of the past ten years, only to be eclipsed by one other… 1. The Killing (Forbrydelsen) What else can I say about The Killing which hasn’t already been said? Likely the best TV series to have ever emerged from Denmark, it was remarkable for devoting equal emphasis to the three concurrent storylines of the police investigation, the victim’s family and the political side-effects of the murder – as well as being elevated by the presence of a superb jumper-wearing heroine, Sarah Lund, played magnificently by Sofie Gråbøl. The mystery itself was absorbing, but the real focus of the series was the damage the investigation had on the main characters. Lund is relentless, pursuing a seemingly endless stream of suspects, all the while alienating herself from everyone close to her.

The families of the victim are sucked into a maelstrom of grief, and political candidates are faced with obstacles and corruption; Lars Mikkelsen (brother of Mads) was particularly good as idealistic mayoral candidate Troels Hartmann in the first series. It was also distinctive in its evocation and photography of Copenhagen as a murky, noir-ish city of abandoned warehouses and threats in the shadows. The show ran for three series, all of which were good – admittedly, by the end there was a rather predictable formula emerging, but the initial 20-episode run was undoubtedly one of the greatest TV murder mysteries of all time. Don’t make the mistake of thinking you don’t need to watch this show if you’ve seen the AMC remake – it pales in comparison to the original. Scandinavian television is currently as good as it’s ever been, and the progression from the warm melodrama of the 1970s and 80s (to which Matador belonged) to the grittier police procedurals of the late 90s and 2000s has been hugely beneficial to both Sweden and Denmark’s artistic reputation.

Attention from the BBC regarding Wallander and The Killing has also helped the shows on this list succeed internationally – The Killing’s third series on BBC Four peaked at over one million viewers – as well as bringing to our attention overseas talents (Both Mads and Lars Mikkelsen are now enjoying international success, the former starring in Hannibal and the latter playing the villain in an upcoming episode of BBC’s Sherlock). Of course, I couldn’t possibly cram every show I wanted to in this list, and some honourable mentions go to The Eagle: A Crime Odyssey, another very good police procedural drama, but not quite distinctive enough to make it on the list; the decent adaptations of Jan Arnal’s Arne Dahl novels, although I felt this strayed too close to Wallander territory; and Lars Von Trier’s bizarre mini-series The Kingdom was considered for how, uh, different it was. Residents of the US will have a relatively tough time trying to find a legal way to watch these shows, although The Killing and The Bridge are both available on UK Netflix, as well as some episodes of Wallander. Sarah Lund (II) - News NEWS Which shows and actors deserve to win at Sunday's TV Baftas ceremony? Could all the big awards go West?

Tell us your hopes and fears Read the full list of 2012 nominations On Sunday evening the great and good of UK telly will gather at the Royal Festival Hall for the British Academy Television Awards – a celebration of the best programmes and performances of the past year that also tends to provoke controversy. (Last year's big, although entirely foreseeable upset: Towie beating Sherlock to the Bafta YouTube audience award. This year's potential upset: Celebrity Juice doing the same). So who should be sweeping off with what? We discussed the nominations – and in some cases lack of them – in a blog when they were released. But now it's time to pick our winners. The acting categories seem particularly close this year, with Benedict Cumberbatch , Dominic West , John Simm and Joseph Gilgun all » - Vicky Frost 18 May 2012 8:09 AM, PDT | The Guardian - TV News | See recent The Guardian - TV News news » The Scandinavian drama's quirky characters and fast-paced plot have kept viewers riveted. Share your theories about the killer ahead of this weekend's final episodes Spoiler warning: this blog presumes you have seen episodes seven and eight of The Bridge.

Don't read on if you haven't – and don't post spoilers if you've seen the finale. Just when you think that BBC4 must be all out of gripping Scandinavian dramas for its Saturday night double bills, the channel seems to rummage about the European schedules and produce another corker. And while The Bridge arguably might not be quite as brilliant as some of the channel's other finds, it has proved to be one of TV's spring treats: a gripping, twisty mystery of the kind that makes missing an episode absolutely unthinkable. It has also given us a marvellous – not to mention unlikely – police double-act in the shape of Saga Noren and Martin Rohde, » - Vicky Frost 11 May 2012 4:13 PM, PDT | The Guardian - TV News | See recent The Guardian - TV News news » Sofia Helin is the star of The Bridge, the latest hit Scandinavian crime thriller. So what's it like to play Saga Noren, with her Porsche, leather trousers and endearing lack of social graces? Sofia Helin is looking at me thoughtfully.

In a fashionably industrial-style office in the shadow of one of Stockholm's ferry terminals, the mother of two is struggling to make sense of the UK's sudden obsession with Scandinavian crime dramas and, specifically, her own popular role in the Swedish-Danish TV drama, The Bridge. "Maybe it's because we have a tradition of dealing with darker subjects," she suggests, trying to pinpoint what makes them stand out. Certainly, she says, the ubiquity has helped to fine-tune them – she counted 13 crime dramas on the Swedish TV schedules while she was considering taking on the role of the socially awkward policewoman Saga Noren. But for fans of so-called Nordic noir, the explanation » - Homa Khaleeli 7 May 2012 5:51 AM, PDT | Boomtron | See recent Boomtron news » The Killing (the English title for Danish television series Forbrydelsen), has been a considerable hit, spawning a Us television remake, and now a novelisation. The Danish series has been lauded for its moody approach to the police procedural, and has been compared favourably to both Twin Peaks and The Wire.

The Us series has been criticised as an awful imitation of The Wire and Twin Peaks . Now, The Telegraph reports, British native David Hewson has adapted the Danish series into a novel. And, according to The Telegraph he’s done a pretty bang-up job, too. Now, my main experience with novelisations was with the groovy Jurassic Park adaptation I read as a kid – “the book based on the movie based on the book!” which had colour photos in the middle – that was what you were missing all along, Mr Crichton! There’s no word on whether Hewson’s words have » - Liam Jose 5 May 2012 2:59 PM, PDT | The Guardian - TV News | See recent The Guardian - TV News news » Have Saga and Martin ended this week closer to finding out the identity of the self-styled Truth Terrorist? Do they now have enough information to be "in the same place, at the same time" as the killer? Spoiler Alert: This blog is for those watching The Bridge on BBC4. If you haven't seen episodes five and six, do not read on – and if you've seen further in the series, please do not leave spoilers.

Vicky Frost's episodes three and four blog Oooh. Gripping eh? Hello everyone, and welcome to this week's blog – bring your best plots and suspicions to the comment box, because it's beginning to get really very complicated indeed. (Not that I think you need any encouragement – many of you have already proved to be well ahead of me in picking up clues). After last week's blood-draining sequence, I was slightly worried that The Bridge might become increasingly gruesome. » - Vicky Frost 3 May 2012 5:26 AM, PDT | The Guardian - TV News | See recent The Guardian - TV News news » Channel 4 show attracts fewer viewers than original series on BBC4 as Law & Order: Special Victims Unit beats it The second series of the American version of Danish drama hit The Killing began with fewer viewers on Channel 4 than the original series had on BBC4. The Killing Us – which features Mireille Enos as detective Sarah Linden – launched with just over 700,000 viewers, a 3.9% share, between 10pm and 10.55pm on Wednesday.

BBC4's second series of The Killing – starring Sofie Gråbøl as detective Sarah Lund – began with 815,000 viewers in November last year. The Us version of the show took the lead when Channel 4 +1 is included – but only just – with a total audience of 817,000. On Channel 4 the second season returned with a fraction of the total audience of 2.4 million who watched the double episode opener of the first series of The Killing Us in July last year. 30 April 2012 9:48 AM, PDT | The Guardian - TV News | See recent The Guardian - TV News news » Shadow media minister Helen Goodman says portrayal of women on Danish TV 'more positive, more realistic' than in UK UK broadcasters should take inspiration from Scandinavian TV hits such as The Killing in the way they portray women on screen, according to the shadow media minister Helen Goodman. The Labour MP, who met with BBC director general Mark Thompson last week to discuss the lack of women on television, said broadcasters had "made progress but they need to continue that positive trend".

She said the portrayal of women on Danish TV, responsible for hits including The Killing, Borgen and BBC4's latest overseas hit The Bridge, a co-production with Sweden's national broadcaster, was "more positive, more realistic, and more like real people". " Sarah Lund [from The Killing] is more convincing than Helen Mirren [who played Jane Tennison in Prime Suspect]. She was too glamorous," Goodman told a Voice of the Listener and Viewer conference in London on Monday. Of her meeting with Thompson, » - John Plunkett 23 April 2012 3:22 AM, PDT | The Guardian - TV News | See recent The Guardian - TV News news » Unlike Sarah Lund , Saga Noren is hard to love – but then, The Bridge is an icy Nordic Noir Here we go again, then: another murky Scandinavian thriller that will be watched by not very many people (though probably a lot for a foreign import on BBC4) but that will generate an enormous amount of coverage in certain corners of the media. This corner, in fact. Because we are those people. Come on then, let's dive into the gloom and get involved with The Bridge (Saturday, BBC4).

The Bridge of the title is the big one that connects Denmark and Sweden, the Oresund bridge; this is a collaboration between the two countries. That's going to be tricky for those of us whose understanding of Danish is pretty much perfect after 40 hours of The Killing and Borgen, to have another confusingly similar language mixed in. May have to look at the subtitles for these first two episodes. » - Sam Wollaston The 70s (BBC2) | iPlayer The discerning viewer's love affair with slow-moving, short-titled Scandinavian crime drama looks likely to continue, courtesy of The Bridge, BBC4's latest compelling reason to spend Saturday night cultivating a belated interest in some of the world's least loved languages. Keeping one eye on the plot with the other scurrying after the subtitles is generally enough, but here were other nuances. The bridge in question (the one between Sweden and Denmark) served as an atmospheric crime scene, but also an elastic metaphor for anything with two sides to it, not least the cultural space between those countries.

If the refreshingly fully dressed dead woman wasn't sufficiently distracting – lying prone in the » - Phil Hogan 20 April 2012 4:09 PM, PDT | The Guardian - TV News | See recent The Guardian - TV News news » BBC4's latest instalment of Scandi noir is a Swedish-Danish co-production, which the channel hopes will feed British desire for Nordic thrillers When it comes to imported dramas on BBC4, viewers have grown used to scanning the translation at the bottom of the screen. But for the channel's latest Scandinavian treat, Nordic viewers also had to watch via subtitles. The Bridge, BBC4's new Saturday-night crime drama, which starts on Saturday, features a pair of Swedish and Danish detectives – sadly Lund and Wallander were otherwise engaged – investigating the discovery of a woman's body exactly halfway across the Oresund bridge, which links their countries. With half the dialogue in Swedish, and half in Danish, the show was subtitled when broadcast in Scandinavia – and BBC4 viewers convinced that they've got their ear in after being glued to first Wallander, then The Killing and, most recently, Borgen, will be able to put their theory to the test.

» - Vicky Frost 27 March 2012 4:06 PM, PDT | The Guardian - TV News | See recent The Guardian - TV News news » Visit to her favourite TV drama was special request for last day of royal couple's Scandinavian tour Fans of Nordic noir TV hit The Killing may want to look away – now. Not that the Duchess of Cornwall, visiting the set of the Danish thriller on Tuesday, was giving anything away about the new series. "My lips are sealed," she said after watching part of the third series being filmed at a scrapyard in Lynge, a small town north of Copenhagen. But as Sofie Gråbøl , who plays taciturn detective Sarah Lund , accompanied the royal guest, one crucial detail did slip. "It is still in the same style – but yes, it's blue," said Gråbøl of her equally famous co-star – the jumper.

The royal visit to the set, on the last day of a week-long Nordic tour by the Prince of Wales and his wife, was at the specific request of the duchess, » - Lars Eriksen, Caroline Davies 27 March 2012 4:06 PM, PDT | The Guardian - TV News | See recent The Guardian - TV News news » The Duchess of Cornwall has been given a Sarah Lund -style jumper by Sofie Gråbøl during a set visit to the show. And if her reaction is anything to go by, she really is an obsessive Things are getting harder and harder for fans of The Killing . This time last year it was our special show, a subtitled oddity that arrived with little fanfare, tucked away on BBC Four where nobody could find it. When you stumbled across The Killing you felt like you were joining an exclusive club full of people with taste just as exquisite as yours. That seems so long ago now, for here is the Duchess of Cornwall being presented with a Sarah Lund -style faroese jumper – by Lund herself. First, there was David Cameron professing his love for the show. Now fans have to come to terms with the Duchess of Cornwall liking it too.

» - Stuart Heritage 27 March 2012 1:03 PM, PDT | Digital Spy | See recent Digital Spy - Movie News news » The Duchess of Cornwall has admitted that she is 'addicted' to The Killing during a visit to the show's set in Denmark. Camilla held up a journalist with a fake gun and was presented with a jumper identical to one worn by lead character Sarah Lund ( Sofie Gråbøl ) in the crime programme. While watching filming of the third series take place at a scrapyard outside Copenhagen, the wife of Prince Charles reportedly commented: "I'm an addict. I'm so excited by this." The trip was specially requested by Camilla for the final day of an eight-day tour of Scandinavia with the Prince (more) » - By Daniel Sperling 27 March 2012 12:30 PM, PDT | PEOPLE.com | See recent PEOPLE.com news » There's a new sheriff in town - sort of. Yes, that's Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall, and she's pulling a (fake) gun during a visit to the set of the Danish show The Killing Monday in Copenhagen.

According to reports, Camilla, a big fan of the European murder mystery series (which has been adapted in English for U.S. audiences by AMC), plotted the set visit, in an abandoned scrapyard, as part of her Scandinavian tour. She was joined on set by Denmark's Crown Princess Mary and the show's star Sofie Grabol . "I think it is really surreal. But it's lovely » Fay Weldon , writer, born 1931 We're so all anxious these days, we tend to forget the sheer exhilaration of the 60s: how exciting, how absurd, how upbeat those years were, how fast was the speed of change, and how we embraced it. The Age of Aquarius was under way, when peace would guide the planet and love would steer the stars. It all seemed so easy. Abandon the old restrictive certainties and all would be well, we thought. No more short back and sides, hair must be long and if you didn't wash it – why, it would self-clean by virtue of the natural oils it contained.

Forget the old tedious phonic route to literacy: just get » - Darcus Howe, Katharine Whitehorn, Yvonne Roberts, Emma Soames, Fay Weldon, Roger McGough 3 March 2012 4:17 PM, PST | The Guardian - TV News | See recent The Guardian - TV News news » The former child star has faced repeated challenges playing Carrie Mathison in Channel 4 's hit Us drama series A maverick detective is one of the oldest stock characters in popular entertainment: the drinker, the brawler, the loner who bends the rules. It is a hoary television tradition that dictates that, just as surely as the hero will eventually be given 24 hours to bring in the evidence, his domestic dynamic will revolve around whether or not his patient girlfriend, or possibly ex-wife, will put up with all the grief. Now, however, a new stable of highly strung female detectives has taken charge of the crime scene, equipped with the sort of extreme psychological problems that rival those of the killers and terrorists they are tracking down.

Chief among these fresh recruits is Carrie Mathison, the bipolar obsessive played by Claire Danes in the hit Us series Homeland , now showing on Channel 4 . » - Vanessa Thorpe 22 February 2012 4:05 PM, PST | The Guardian - TV News | See recent The Guardian - TV News news » Familiar faces from The Killing and Borgen return in ITV3's new Those Who Kill First Ulrik Strange, Sarah Lund 's sidekick from The Killing, turned up in Borgen as glamorous political husband Philip Christensen . Then weedy news editor Torben Friis was revealed to be Lund's previous sidekick, Jan Meyer. It seemed a bit odd that the cast of The Killing had muscled their way into Denmark's answer to The West Wing , but everyone was too busy concentrating on the subtitles and light fittings to think about it too much – even when dear old Theis suddenly appeared, disguised in a suit and glasses. It was just another coincidence. But now? Now I'm worried that Denmark has run out of actors. ITV3 is the unlikely home of the latest Danish crime drama import, Those Who Kill.

And anyone tuning in for the first episode tonight will find that the old Forbrydelsen » - Vicky Frost 12 February 2012 4:05 PM, PST | The Guardian - TV News | See recent The Guardian - TV News news » Helicopters, Lionel Richie , a choir – when proposing on TV you need all the help you can get I've decided not to propose, here in this column, to my girlfriend. Well, she doesn't read it for a start, so it would depend on someone she knows seeing it, and passing it on. Which might take some of the romance and the spontaneity away from it. There's Twitter, I suppose, but she doesn't follow me on that either so I'd have to go begging for a retweet from Stephen Fry or Caitlin Moran or someone and it would look less like a marriage proposal and more like a pathetic attempt to get some more followers (which, to be fair, is what it would be). More importantly, I'm not really that fussed about marriage, nor is she. We muddle along fine in sin.

And, if I'm being really honest, although I love her » - Sam Wollaston The actor who plays prime minister Birgitte Nyborg in the TV series Borgen on the new appeal of Danish drama and whether Denmark's real Pm has asked her for advice • See footnotes at bottom of story You've been a well-known actor in Denmark for years (1). How does it feel now that we Brits think we have discovered you? To be honest, I'm surprised and happy. When we started making Borgen , no one had any idea it would have any appeal outside Denmark. No one expected it to follow the success of The Killing because it's basically all about Danish politics. Quite a few of the same actors (2) who were in The Killing also appear in Borgen . Is this just coincidence? Well, it's not as if Denmark is desperately short of actors and the same faces appear in every show, if that's what you were thinking. Rather it's just that the » - John Crace 31 January 2012 8:49 AM, PST | Digital Spy | See recent Digital Spy - Movie News news » New details have been revealed about the upcoming third series of The Killing .

The crime drama - entitled Forbrydelsen in Denmark - will return to Danish channel Dr in September. Penned by creator Soren Sveistrup, the new run will see Sarah Lund ( Sofie Gråbøl ) take on her final case as she investigates the apparently random killing of a sailor. As her investigation continues, Lund will confront the country's prime minister and delve into parts of society badly hit by the financial crisis. "We're trying to describe a Denmark on the way down, which was not the premise of the first two seasons," said production designer (more) » - By Morgan Jeffery The Killing III, Series Finale, BBC Four | The Arts Desk Home > tv > The Killing III, Series Finale, BBC Four The Killing III, Series Finale, BBC Four | reviews, news & interviews The Killing III, Series Finale, BBC Four The Killing III, Series Finale, BBC Four Multiple themes combine in masterly climax to Danish crime epic by Adam Sweeting Sunday, 16 December 2012 Share Is this the last we'll ever see of Copenhagen's finest, Sarah Lund (Sofie Gråbøl)?

I hope it isn't giving too much away for iPlayer catcher-uppers to say that in the end Sarah Lund never did get that undemanding desk job. Instead, the third outing for this ferociously gripping Danish series dragged us screaming and biting our nails right down to the wire, and managed to reach a conclusion simultaneously shocking and saddening yet, in a way, satisfying too. From the start, the third series has been drenched in the anguish of loss and the pain of separation. The running theme has been the hunt for the kidnapped girl Emilie Zeuthen and the man who took her, but, apart from the distraught and distressed Zeuthen parents, most of the main characters have been carrying their own personal burdens (Anders W Berthelsen as Robert Zeuthen, pictured below). Lund (the surely unimprovable Sofie Gråbøl) has been tentatively reaching out towards her estranged son Mark, in the process being forced to confront her failings as a mother which perhaps inevitably come with the job of homicide detective.

Prime Minister Kristian Kamper (Olaf Johannessen) has been trying to fight an election campaign while coping with unravelling revelations about his dead son Benjamin, whose supposed suicide haunts him even more than precarious opinion polls. The kidnapper himself is driven by grief for his murdered daughter Louise Hjelby, his own neglect having condemned her to a life in care. In one of creator Søren Sveistrup's moments of bleakest irony, Louise was once used in a campaign to promote foster parenting. The final episode had a lot of plates to keep spinning. The election campaign was reaching its climax, with resolution of the Emilie kidnapping seen as critical to the outcome, as Lund and her partner Borch (Nikolaj Lie Kaas) accompanied the kidnapper on an interminable trip to the Norwegian fjords on a promise of finding the missing girl. A sense of fatal dread mounted as they travelled further into the dark Nordic wilderness, the clock ticking down steadily. Meanwhile the police quest for the driver of the black car linked to the Hjelby murder whirred away feverishly in the background, while the possible guilt of Reinhardt, chairman of the Zeeland Children's Trust, advanced and receded frustratingly.

And then there was the Lund-Borch relationship, always bubbling under and apt to erupt volcanically at any moment, yet surely an impossible dream. Especially impressive throughout has been how the layers of the story have interlocked and overlapped without feeling forced or phony. The way the political dimension has been threaded in and out of the the personal and private themes ought to stand as an object lesson to aspiring TV writers, to the extent that you could justifiably describe Killing III as a political drama, as much as a mystery or crime series. Or a love story. Johannessen's portrayal of Prime Minister Kamper has been a mini-marvel of its own, as he has tiptoed around the banana skins of treacherous coalition partners and his own ministers secretly conniving with the shadowy Special Branch. The poles of his personality - ruthless political animal and grieving father - were neatly mirrored in his clinically calculating brother Stoffer (Jonatan Spang, pictured above left with Johannessen) and his super-efficient yet emotionally sympathetic adviser, Karen (Trine Pallesen). Again, the relationship between government and big business, in the shape of the Zeeland shipping conglomerate, was persuasively depicted as an unsentimental commercial bargain.

In a time of plunging recession , Zeeland wanted guaranteed tax breaks if it wasn't going to move its operations overseas. Using Zeeland as a sinister corporate bogeyman became a kind of matador's cloak for the development of the plot. One smart counter-intuitive touch was the way the quest to find missing Emilie brought her estranged parents - her dad was Zeeland's would-be progressive boss Robert Zeuthen (Anders W Berthelsen) - back together, when you'd expect the opposite. The powers that be at The Killing HQ are telling us that this was the last-ever series. Not to overstate it, that would be a shame. A crime, in fact. From the start, the third series has been drenched in the anguish of loss and the pain of separation The Killing (TV Series 2007–2012) - IMDb IMDb There was an error trying to load your rating for this title. Some parts of this page won't work property. Please reload or try later. X Beta I'm Watching This! Keep track of everything you watch; tell your friends. Error Police detective Sarah Lund investigates difficult cases with personal and political consequences.

Creator: It's election day and the Prime Minister has everything to gain but Emilie's fate remains uncertain. 8.7 Sarah and Jan check out a warehouse to look for evidence but something unexpected happens. 8.5 The hunt for a missing suspect takes an unexpected turn. 8.5 a list of 31 titles created 03 Feb 2012 a list of 28 titles created 07 Jul 2012 a list of 26 titles created 24 Sep 2012 a list of 28 titles created 4 months ago a list of 39 titles created 2 months ago Search for " The Killing " on Amazon.com Connect with IMDb Title: The Killing (2007–2012) 8.4/10 Want to share IMDb's rating on your own site? Use the HTML below. You must be a registered user to use the IMDb rating plugin. 12 wins & 14 nominations.

See more awards » Photos The Bridge (TV Series 2011) Crime | Mystery | Thriller When a body is found on the bridge between Denmark and Sweden, right on the border, Danish inspector Martin Rohde and Swedish Saga Norén have to share jurisdiction and work together to find the killer. Stars: Sofia Helin, Rafael Pettersson, Dag Malmberg A political drama about a prime minister's rise to power, and how power changes a prime minister. Stars: Sidse Babett Knudsen, Birgitte Hjort Sørensen, Emil Poulsen A police investigation, the saga of a grieving family, and a Seattle mayoral campaign all interlock after the body of 17-year-old Rosie Larsen is found in the trunk of a submerged car. Stars: Mireille Enos, Joel Kinnaman, Billy Campbell In a remote town in Iceland, Police desperately try to solve a crime as a powerful storm descends upon the town.

Stars: Ólafur Darri Ólafsson, Ilmur Kristjánsdóttir, Ingvar Eggert Sigurðsson The murder of a young boy in a small coastal town brings a media frenzy, which threatens to tear the community apart. Stars: David Tennant, Olivia Colman, Jodie Whittaker When pregnant, 12-year-old Tui tries to kill herself in a freezing New Zealand lake, Detective Robin Griffin has plenty of questions for the girl. But when Tui suddenly disappears, Griffin finds herself knee-deep in small-town secrets. Stars: Elisabeth Moss, Thomas M. Wright, Peter Mullan Happy Valley (TV Series 2014) Crime | Drama Catherine Cawood is the sergeant on duty when flustered and nervous accountant Kevin Weatherill comes into her West Yorkshire station to report a crime. Stars: Sarah Lancashire, Siobhan Finneran, Shane Zaza Those Who Kill (TV Series 2011) Action | Crime | Thriller About the hunt for a type of violent criminal who has yet to strike in Denmark, and who is surrounded by fear and mystique - the serial killer.

Stars: Laura Bach, Jakob Cedergren, Lars Mikkelsen The Fall I (TV Series 2013) Crime | Drama | Thriller Two hunters, one cold, deliberate and highly efficient and the other, a strong, athletic man with a wife. One is a serial killer, and the other is a cop. Stars: Gillian Anderson, Jamie Dornan, John Lynch Perched on the edge of the Arctic Circle, Fortitude is one of the safest towns on earth. There has never been a violent crime here. Until now. Stars: Sofie Gråbøl, Mia Jexen, Luke Treadaway The Legacy (TV Series 2014) Drama The death of a matriarch brings forgotten secrets out into the open and causes a prolonged battle for the family inheritance. Stars: Trine Dyrholm, Marie Bach Hansen, Carsten Bjørnlund The Missing (TV Series 2014) Crime | Drama | Mystery When Tony and Emily Hughes travel to France with their 5-year-old son Oliver, their family holiday turns into a nightmare when Oliver disappears from a large celebrating crowd in Northern France.

Stars: Tchéky Karyo, Anastasia Hille, James Nesbitt The Killing | Nordic Noir: The Scandinavian Crime Book Club Nordic Noir: The Scandinavian Crime Book Club Forshaw explores the sounds of Nordic Noir TV drama Danish composer Halfdan E has scored all three seasons of ‘Borgen’. His music won the Fipa d´Or Grand Prize in 2012 for best score. Barry Forshaw has published a fascinating article on the CrimeTime blog, and wanted to tell us in the Nordic Noir Book Club about it. Barry Forshaw: “I met the talented composer Halfdan E at a meal at the Danish ambassador’s for the stars and creative team of such shows as Borgen and The Killing – and I discovered we had a connection. I’d written the introduction for the Norvik Press edition of Dan Turrell’s Murder in the Dark, and Halfdan had collaborated with the late writer on the CD ‘An Introduction.’ I asked the composer about his work on Borgen.” Read the interview on CrimeTime .

Danish language for The Killing fans For those of you looking forward to the new series of The Killing, starting on BBC4 tomorrow evening, have a look at this short film with a crash course in Danish, featuring Jesper Hansen (with obligatory Forbrydelsen-style sweater) from the UCL Scandinavian Studies. Co-starring our departmental Polar Bear Skull. Full details here: Danish TV-thriller Borgen hits the British Isles Danish TV-drama Borgen on BBC4 For all the viewers of the Killing I and II on BBC4 the past year, the airing Saturday of the new Danish political TV-thriller, Borgen, should be great news. Nordic Noir fans should be warned, if you still have Borgen queued on BBC iPlayer, however, that Borgen, now with its third season in production by Danish Radio Fiction, is in a very different genre than the nail biting and dark police procedural of the Killing.

Viewers of the Killing should by now be experts in the Danish political system (Both I and II had important political side plots), coalition governance, and the dark side of the Danish welfare state – and should be able to follow Birgitte Nyborg (played by Sidse Babett Knudsen, one of my 4 favourite Danish actresses!) with little effort: her balancing act between ‘staying true to ones values’ and the desire for political power; the modern woman’s Herculean task of being the perfect mother and wife while being ambitious and having a demanding career in a ‘masculine game’. This theme, and such female characters, have become expected of Scandinavian drama, thrillers and crime fiction ( read this excellent article “Nothing like a Dane” in The Independent about the strong female leads in Danish TV-drama ). Obviously Birgitte Nyborg and Sarah Lund are very different characters though both strong willed – and when the BBC will show Broen/Bron/The Bridge later this year we will welcome yet another interesting female character to the list (in my view The Bridge is by far the most thrilling crime series to come out of Scandinavia).

I would love to hear some opinions about the difference in their characters, and also about the way Danish politics are being represented in these dramas, The Killing and Borgen.

Question: Sarah Lund is the central character in which Danish detective series, shown on BBC Four?
Answer: The Killing